DOTN: Citizen Journalism In Africa

One of the dubiously nice things about living in Africa is that you’re never short of a news story or two. This might explain why home grown journalism is taking off in a huge way. So much so that Johnnic, one of the largest local media groups (they publish the Sunday Times and Sowetan), are launching their own citizen written online newspaper www.reporter.co.za. The site, which launches next week from what I can gather, is edited by a fulltime editorial team and there is the added novelty that those with articles that get selected get paid… Not that anyone will be giving up their day jobs just yet as it is the equivalent of about 3 pound a story.

The company name check punk rock as an inspiration for the site, which is nice for a big media house: “PUNK ROCK’s revolution of the commercial music industry in the late 1970s is happening to the world’s media. Free-thinking, self-taught and irreverent journalism has evolved from complaining letter-writers into hard-hitting, on-the-spot reporting which is breaking down barriers and re-defining what makes the news.”

I suspect Johnnic have one eye on the success of community radio stations in South Africa. For example Jozi FM, a Soweto based station, has upwards of one million listeners and is putting commercial stations to shame.

Contributed by Dan Pinch

Related PSFK Articles
The Death Of The Newspaper
The Death Of The Newspaper Cont.
Local To Go Global? The Critical Weakness In MSM’s Future